I just opened my 50th e-mail of the day, and so far I've sent eight replies. Yeah for BlackBerries! And I mean that; I'd rather deal with that stuff while on vacation than have it all piled up for me on Monday morning.
In between messages, I'm fly-fishing for smallmouth bass in this stretch of the South Fork of the Shenandoah River, which is just downstream from a little hydro dam. I know the fish are here somewhere, probably hiding in the deeper pools and staying in the shade, but so far they are nowhere near as busy as my phone.
All in all, a pleasant way to spend the week.
12 comments:
TSB: More clues that Turkey may decide NATO isn't really important compared to reliable energy sources and that Russians are more reliable than Fogghy Bottom. gwb
http://freebeacon.com/gold-for-oil/
TSB: Great news: The Army historian at West Point has made a statement about Iraq and Afghanistan. I can't find it to read yet, but the summary: "Not worth the effort." Maybe he will say something next about bass fishing! gwb
GWB: You must mean this interview in the NYT:
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/05/28/world/at-west-point-asking-if-a-war-doctrine-was-worth-it.html?_r=1
No doubt, the next ten years will be filled with military memoirs, papers, books, and what-not all saying the same thing.
Thanks TSB!
TSB: This is pretty elementary, but most brilliant stuff is. gwb
http://wemeantwell.com/blog/?p=7112
For counter-insurgency to work you need insurgents. To have insurgents you need a legitimate goverment that has the support of the people. That's how Nam-Iraq-Afghanistan are alike and Pakistan is out of the question.
You need insurgents and a legitimate government before you can have a counterinsurgency, plus - and this is the point that always infuriates me - only that legitimate government can do COIN.
How can the U.S. military, an outside force and a culturally alien one, do COIN in Afghanistan? "Protect the civilian population"? If we asked the civilian population, they'd probably say they need protection against us first of all.
COIN is just another name for not having a national strategy.
TSB: Just starting Arthur Herman's book (Freedom's Forge). 1777-1812-1837-1862-1877-1912-1937-1962-1987-2012. For over 200 yrs this 25 year cycle has marked a political/economic crisis that resulted in war or war narrowly averted. Herman sure knows how to tell a good and timely story! gwb
I'll have to get that one. BTW, you can listen to a talk he gave about it here:
http://www.aei.org/events/2012/05/14/freedoms-forge-how-american-business-produced-victory-in-world-war-ii/
The same kind of argument is made in Victor Davis Hanson's book Carnage and Culture.
Regarding Herman, he was a great lecturer in the classes I took, very unlike the Socratic method that you get in many seminars. He often told us "you don't get the Readers Digest version from me."
Thanks TSB! I just caught the last 10 mins of questions on that one so I will enjoy the whole thing now! It's amazing that HJ Kaiser got his start in Spokane when it was a mining "boomtown" of 100,000 people and nobody would give him a job! 25 yrs later he built Grand Coulee Dam. (Readers Digest never told me.) gwb
TSB: I asked my cat what he thought about this guy and he backed away saying: "looks like sick possum." gwb
http://www.aljazeera.com/news/middleeast/2012/07/2012716134457158368.html
GWB: Wow, I had forgotten that he was even still alive. Too bad they're keeping him in prison. Usually ex-dictators on their death beds are allowed to go into exile in some pleasant remote location.
TSB: A good summary of the basic banking facts of the last few yrs confirms that rather than fight it the banks have been competing with each other for their share of drug
$$$ laundering and makes it clear why nobody ever gets punished. JPM rigged electric rates and won't give up the emails? I'm shocked!!
gwb http://www.huffingtonpost.com/charles-ferguson/bank-crimes_b_1675714.html
Post a Comment